Transcriber's notes:
All material added by the transcriber is surrounded by braces {}.
The original has a number of inconsistent spellings and punctuation.
Three corrections have been made for obvious typographical errors;
they have been noted individually in the text.
Text in italics in the original is shown between _underlines_.
Superscript (three instances in this book) is marked by a caret (^).
LIFE IN A MEDIÆVAL CITY
Illustrated by York in the XVth Century
by
EDWIN BENSON, B.A.
With Eight Illustrations
London:
Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge
New York: The MacMillan Co.
1920
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
CHAPTER II
IMPORTANT FACTORS AFFECTING THE HISTORY OF YORK
(_a_) Geographical position; (_b_) Military value of its position;
(_c_) Political importance
CHAPTER III
APPEARANCE
A. _General appearance_
Church, State, people; outside the city; population; area-divisions
B. _Streets_
Highways, traffic, open-spaces; Ouse Bridge
C. _Buildings_
Dwelling-houses, shops, inns; civic buildings (guildhalls);
fortifications (castle, city walls, bars); religious buildings
(Minster; St. William's College; St. Mary's Abbey; Friaries; St.
Clement's Nunnery; Hospitals; Parish Churches)
D. _York as a Port_
CHAPTER IV
LIFE
A. _Civic Life_
City government, the parishes; extra municipal rights; a royal city;
charter; sheriffs; mayor; city councils; civic spirit; city and trade
rule; royal government; punishments; sanctuary
B. _Parliamentary and National Life_
Leasing of royal power; Parliament; visits of Henry IV.; Wars of
Roses; Duke of Gloucester; judges of assize; royal larder
C. _Business Life_
Middle class of merchant employers; Jews and Italians; professions;
wool trade; trade-guilds; their government; strangers; phases of guild
life; merchants; apprentices; working hours; trades; artist craftsmen;
markets and fairs; overseas trade; money; extracts from ordinances
D. _Religious Life_
The Church in the Middle Ages; the Church and daily life; merchants
and religion; the Church and education; work of hospitals; priests (at
Minster; parish churches; Archbishop); pluralism; religious orders;
monastic life; St. Mary's Abbey; Anchorites; other types of religious
(pardoner, palmer, pilgrim {original had "pligrim"}); Church services
E. _Education_
Higher education; grammar schools; elementary education; educational
welfare work; instruction; the ways in which the citizen got news and
information; vocations; literacy in fifteenth century; mediæval
learning; Revival of Learning
F. _Entertainments_
Holidays, travelling; mediæval plays; York plays; Corpus Christi Day
Processions; production of pageants; other forms of entertainment;
archery
G. _Classes_
Fashions and dress; nobles; religious; townspeople; women; the
freemen; soldiers; men in royal service; lepers; visitors (kings,
lords, commoners; judges; sailors) serfs
CHAPTER V
CONCLUSION
York a city of destruction and a "storehouse of the past"
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
YORK IN THE XVTH CENTURY
_(From a drawing by E. Ridsdale Tate)_
COOKING WITH THE SPIT
_(From the Louttrell Psalter)_
BISHOP AND CANONS
_(From Richard II.'s "Book of Hours")_
KNIGHTS DOING PENANCE AT A SHRINE
_(From a XVth Century MS.)_
ADMINISTRATION OF HOLY COMMUNION WITH HOUSEL CLOTH
_(From a XIVth Century MS.)_
SEMI-CHOIR OF FRANCISCANS
_(From a XVth Century MS.)_
ARCHERY
_(From the Louttrell Psalter)_
AN ABBOT
[Illustration: YORK IN THE XVTH CENTURY FROM A DRAWING BY E.
RIDSDALE TATE]
A MEDIÆVAL CITY
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
In English history the fifteenth century is the last of the centuries
that form the Middle Ages, which were preceded by the age of racial
settlement and followed by that of the great Renaissance. Although the
active beginnings of this new era are to be observed in the fifteenth
century, yet this century belongs essentially to the Middle Ages.
Perhaps the most attractive feature of the Middle Ages is that they
were so intensely human. A naïve spirit appears in their formal
literature, as in Chaucer's account of the Canterbury pilgrims, in
their decorated religious manuscripts, in their thought, and very
characteristically, in their architecture, which combines a simple
naturalness with a bold and daring ingenuity. From columns, the
constructional motive of which is so simple and natural, and walls
pierced with windows, they erected systems of lofty arches and high
stone-vaulted roofs, the stability of which depended on very skilled
balancing of thrust and counter-thrust.
To-day mediæval buildings are to be found all over England. The
majority of them are examples of an architecture that has not been
surpassed for majesty, beauty, size, and constructional skill. Such
buildings, without the help of the literary and other memorials,
testify by themselves to the greatness of the Middle Ages.
Through the fifteenth century England continued to be in a state of
political unrest. There were wars and risings both abroad and at home,
for besides the Hundred Years' War (1337-1453) and the Wars of the
Roses (1455-1485) there were wars with the Welsh and the Scots, as
well as disorders made by powerful, intriguing barons. The barons and
great landowners took advantage of the weak royal rule to increase
their own power. Parliament, especially the House of Commons,
succeeded in the first half of the century in strengthening its
constitutional position, but during the Wars of the Roses it became
less truly representative of the solid part of the nation, the middle
class, and more and more a party machine worked by the baronial
factions. The proportion of people wanting peace and firm government
steadily increased, and, when the internecine Wars of the Roses, which
affected the lords and kings far more than the people, were followed
by the protection and order provided without excessive cost by the
Tudors, it was the people who most welcomed the change.
The towns were, however, comparatively little disturbed by these
perpetual disorders. The mayors and corporations as a rule guided
their cities through difficult times with politic shrewdness. Town
life developed through flourishing trade and an increasing sense of
municipal unity, and municipal importance.